


Because you're mine, I walk the line

by heavenisalibrary



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-10
Updated: 2015-12-10
Packaged: 2018-05-05 22:27:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5392559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heavenisalibrary/pseuds/heavenisalibrary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She stands up and turns to face him, abandoning her lock-picking for a moment, and pulls the diary out of her clutch, which must be bigger on the inside, even though he’s not quite sure how she managed it without the TARDIS. The sight of the little blue book makes his throat close up, and he’s glad once more she can’t really see him, because for a moment he hasn’t got a clue what his face is doing, nor any idea how to move it.</p><p>“Doctor?” she prods. “Have you done —”</p><p>“I haven’t got my diary,” he says.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Because you're mine, I walk the line

**Author's Note:**

> Started writing this before the whole "River knows how finite her diary is" thing happened, because it occurred to me that if the Doctor thinks River's dead for him, he might not be toting the diary around any longer. And then it devolved into smut because, honestly, don't forget who you're dealing with here.

He forgets about the diaries, because It’s Christmas, and he’s with his wife, and there’s not a whole lot of room in his head to think about much more than that. Of course, his wife is also presently posing as some other bloke’s wife, but since the other bloke is a removable head attached to a mechanical bodyguard with an uncontrollable urge to murder them, and he’s aware that the removable head is in possession of a diamond River’s been coveting for centuries, he thinks there’s a good chance it’s a farce. He says as much to River, but she just fluffs her hair and winks at him, looking resplendent in her silver dress, and taps the side of her nose.

It’s an answer, but it’s also  _not_  an answer, and it drives him more mad than he’d like to admit. He huffs as she sashays off ahead of him to flirt with the ambassador who has the key they need to get out of the public quarters of the spaceship and into the private quarters, where they’ll both be able to find the diamond and lose the body guard. He tries to tell himself he’s not jealous as he follows along behind her with his hands in his pockets. That would be  _ridiculous_. 

Alright, he’s possibly the slightest bit jealous. More than the slightest bit.  _Fine_  — he’s significantly jealous, but it’s not like River knows it.

“She wouldn’t,” River says, “if you didn’t have a knack for saying what you’re thinking  _out loud_ , sweetie.”

He frowns more deeply and his following along behind her as she reaches back to pat his arm patronizingly becomes more like stomping across the ballroom behind her, although he’s not sure if that better communicates the depths of his jealousy or his displeasure with her patronization as he’d intended. Luckily, he doesn’t have to worry about River flirting with strangers for very long, because she’s not five minutes into her conversation when she notices a blinking light clutched in the ambassador’s hand, and so of course she detonates the explosive herself, snatching it away from him before he can blink, and she grabs the Doctor’s hand as they plunge through the floor.

She’s grinning like a maniac when they land in the rubble, immediately hopping up with her hand tight around his, and dragging him off to the side so that they can run.

“I know he meant to kill me,” River says, “but I figured if I stepped a few meters to the left the floor would fall out above the storage room in the basement of the ship and take out the weak wall on the port side that would...”

She pauses, dragging him over the rubble at the bottom of a sizable hole in the wall and peering around before grinning maniacally again and looking more than a little smug as she continues on. She still hasn’t let go of his hand, and he’s not about to point it out to her.

“...let us into the living sector straight away. No need for a key, after all. Figured I’d spare you the flirting.”

“You’re a regular saint,” the Doctor says. “Not counting the detonating explosives in crowded areas, destruction of property, polygamy, and, oh, I don’t know. Petty larceny.”

“Please, honey,” River says. “Felony robbery, at the absolute _least_.”

“What’s worse than felony robbery?”

“Dunno,” River says, and he hears the laughter in her voice, even though he can’t quite see her as they prowl through the dark rooms. She gives his hand a squeeze. “Want to find out?”

“Not particularly.”

She clicks her tongue. “So serious this go. Would you prefer I stop so you can give me a proper scolding?”

“No,” he says, glad for the cover of making their way through the deserted sector in the dark, because he doesn’t think he’d ever live down the indignity of blushing slightly with this new, more grown-up face. Seems her effect on him is much unchanged. She stops, dropping his hand so that she can kneel on the ground in front of a door, pulling a pin out of her hair to begin picking the lock. “I’m sure you would like it, though.”

“Oooh,” she purrs, “I do love when you go all strict. And with this voice and those eyebrows — honey, I’ll gladly halt my heist for a little... discipline.”

“You haven’t changed a bit,” he says, scrubbing a hand over his face.

“And I never will,” she says, and it makes him smile, because she’s repeating his own words back to him, and he’s missed that familiarity. He’s missed this rapport with someone who really, properly knows him, and who he really, properly knows. She drives him absolutely insane with jealousy and worry and sheer bloody frustration at her recklessness, and it all feels an awful lot like home. “That reminds me — shall we do diaries?”

She stands up and turns to face him, abandoning her lock-picking for a moment, and pulls the diary out of her clutch, which  _must_  be bigger on the inside, even though he’s not quite sure how she managed it without the TARDIS. The sight of the little blue book makes his throat close up, and he’s glad once more she can’t really see him, because for a moment he hasn’t got a clue what his face is doing, nor any idea how to move it.

“Doctor?” she prods. “Have you done —”

“I haven’t got my diary,” he says.

“What do you mean you haven’t got it? Did you —”

“I don’t carry it anymore,” he says. “I haven’t in a long, long time.”

She’s silent. He steps nearer to her, reaching out in the dark until he feels her arm and grabs hold to stead himself as he moves close enough to make out her features.

“So,” she says, and she’s doing a piss-poor job of sounding casual, “that either means we’re straightened out or I’m dead, hm? I suppose you also could’ve just stopped seeing me. On purpose or otherwise.”

He swallows. “Spoilers.”

“Now  _that_  won’t keep me up at night,” she says, still sounding far more upset than he knows she’d like, or maybe it’s the dark; maybe when he can’t see her carefully arranged expression, he notices the tells he usually misses.

“It’s not —” he cuts himself off, realizing he can’t answer at all.

“Well,” she says, “just for future — or for past, I suppose — reference, if you’re going to leave me, or whatever constitutes leaving in a marriage where you don’t live together, I want notice.”

“You know I can’t answer you.”

He squeezes her arm again, but he feels her shaking slightly, and when he squints against the dark and steps even closer, he can see that her expression isn’t carefully arranged at all — she looks  _scared_. He wants to tell her that she’ll never die — that she’ll never be gone, to him, not really, that he can always see hear smell taste  _touch_  her because he’s got enough of his brain committed to memorizing every miracle molecule that makes her up that he’ll never forget her. He wants to tell her that he wishes they were straightened out, but that it wouldn’t be good, anyway. That they’d be happy, but they’d wreak havoc on the universe, and like it a bit too much. He wants to tell her that he didn’t — wouldn’t —  _couldn’t_  leave her, not if he knew she was still alive, because he loves her, but he’s never been good at saying it, and this face is worse than most of his previous ones at sentiment.

He’s sure she’s scared to think she’s going to die, as everybody is, but he’s almost equally distraught to hear her say that she thinks he could properly leave her. Doesn’t she  _know_? Doesn’t she  _get_  what she is to him? But he doesn’t know how to say any of it, so it just circles in his head as he searches for the right thing to say, until he realizes that he can’t say anything — he can’t confirm or deny any of it, because she’s too clever by half, and whittling down her options will only lead her to the proper conclusions or make her paranoid or frighten her more, and so he just sighs and does the exact opposite of what this body is always compelled to do: he grabs her tighter and kisses her, holding her close as he can.

She’s slow to respond, and he can feel her warring with herself about pressing him for more information, but after a moment she relaxes and throws her arms around his neck, kissing him for all she’s worth, and he tries to make sure she knows. He tries to make sure that she can feel it in how his whole body sighs into her, in how he grabs at her like she’s his lifeline, in how her breathes her in, in how he tries to taste every inch of her as he pulls back and kisses his way down her neck as she fists her hands in his blazer and pulls him with her into the wall — he tries to make sure she can feel all of the things he can’t say. He knows it’s inadequate, and he thinks that if she were a little  _less_ , it would be easier to say what he means, but then he doesn’t think he’d feel how he does if she were anything else, and so all he can do is press her back into the wall and kiss her hungrily.

He knows that they've got more pressing things to do, and that someone will be after them shortly, but for once it isn't his plan or even his adventure, and so he's going to leave all of that to River. Right now, he just wants all of her all over him until he forgets what it feels like to be without her.

Thankfully, she's River, and she's way ahead of him, sliding her hands under his blazer and shucking it off of his shoulders before her nimble fingers immediately go for the buttons of his shirt, and he pulls away from her mouth to kiss along her neck again as she continues to undress him. He sucks at the skin on the side of her throat, and further still, down along the sparkling silver of her bodice. He drags his teeth along her bare flesh, just at the top of her breast, and sucks again, making sure he leaves a mark. He wants her other husband — even if he's fake — to know that she belongs with him; the Doctor and River Song, holding hands through all of time and space. Once River unbuttons his shirt, she takes her time running her fingers over his exposed chest, her kisses slower, less focused when he returns his mouth to hers. He starts to get frustrated, before he remembers that this is the first time she's touched this him, like this. How could he ever forget?

" _So_ ," he repeats, "what do you think of my new body?"

She laughs low in her throat.

"I'll need to conduct further studies to give you my fully formed opinion," she says. 

"Bloody archaeologist," he grumbles, stepping back into her. He's bolder, in this body, and grabs her hands from his chest, instead bringing them down to the top of his trousers as he kisses her again, busying his own hands with rucking up the skirt of her dress. He feels her smile against his lips as she sets to unbuttoning him, and then his trousers are sliding down his legs and her clever fingers are slipping inside his pants and he has to stop kissing her to gasp because he  _can't_  possibly manage to do anything else.

He presses his forehead to hers as he just freezes, her skirt gathered around her hips in his hands, his fingertips touching just the barest edge of the skin of her thighs as she wraps her hand around his cock and begins to stroke him up and down. This body doesn't much care for touching, and he has to push past more than a few knee-jerk negative reactions to make himself touch even River, but now that he has and she's touching him like this, her breath on her lips, her eyes wide and amused on his face as he tries to remember how to breathe, he's knocked senseless by the desperation with which he  _wants_. He wants her like he's never wanted her before, maybe  _because_ this regeneration holds itself apart, when it finds cause to be close he wants to be  _close._ He wants to be closer to River than her own skin. He wants to press her hands against his hearts so she can feel how hard they're beating in his chest, just because she's touching him, and then press them deep still, through his fragile skin and between his rib bones until she can hold them in her hands and understand that they are her right — that they are  _hers_ , because he doesn't know how to tell her. 

When he finally lurches into action, he groans against her lips as she continues to stroke him, pressing her back against the wall and hurrying to shove her skirt all the way up so he can slide his hand between her legs. He doesn't kiss her, though. He doesn't want to kiss her because then he'd be lost in her, he'd close his eyes and let the wave of pleasure she's growing in him take him over, and he wants to see her. It's not easy, in the dark, but this close he can see her bite her lip when he runs his long fingers over her wet folds, he can see the light in her eyes as she tilts her head back to rest against the wall, he can see the hitching rise of her chest as his thumb presses against her clit, as she grips his shoulder bruisingly tight to leverage one of her legs up over his hip to give him better access. He wants to tell her, as he stares at her in the dark, tangled up in her, his hips jerking against her hand, two of his fingers buried inside of her, why he's doing this — that it's not just because he wants her, although of course he does, that it's not just because he needs to be touched and held and loved like this, although of course he does, but because he needs her to  _know_. And it sounds so simple, to just say the words, it's something he should be brave enough to do, but he isn't. He just isn't, and he can't, but he can hold her now that she's here and real and solid, and he can touch her like she's the most precious thing in the universe — because she very nearly is — and he can show her that he, the man who gets off on running away from bad guys and stumping them with mad plans, the man who  _lives_ for those moments, would rather be here in the dark with her than anywhere else. 

" _Sweetie,"_ she whines, wrapping her other arm around his shoulder and dragging in a shuddering breath. " _Hurry_."

"You don't get to order me about this go around," he says, but he reaches down to wrap an arm beneath her thigh anyway, helping to hitch her up higher on the wall as she wraps both her arms around his neck for a bit of leverage. Drawing his hand back from between her legs, he presses his damp fingers between her lips before she can snark back at him, and she licks the taste of herself off of his skin without a word. When he gets his hand back, he uses it to line himself up, and with a little shimmying against the wall and what's probably mostly River's considerable strength, he pushes inside of her.

The sound she makes goes straight through him, making him tingle from head to toe, and she slides her hands beneath the fabric of his open shirt, digging her nails ruthlessly into his skin as she tightens her legs around his waist, pulling him tighter to her. Part of him wants to slow down, but he knows they're not exactly swimming in time, and he knows that he wouldn't be able to hold out for very long if he wanted to, so he just starts moving. His old body liked to tease and torment, liked a good slow build up and a bit of stumbling and fumbling about that was at least a little bit to frustrate her. This body, though, once it starts moving, has no desire to stop. This body, he realizes, somewhat startled at his own predilection, wants a good, hard fuck. He thrusts into her hard and fast, making sure to press her tight to the wall on each stroke to help hold her up, so he can reach a hand between them to awkwardly press a finger to her clit so he strikes it as they move. Her back arches off of the wall, her quiet gasps grow to keening moans, and he's glad to see that River doesn't seem to mind the new him one bit.

" _Yes_ , honey," she hisses in his ear, and so he keeps going, even when it occurs to him that she's contacting the wall a little hard, even when the rough slap of skin against skin rises in vigor to compete with her moans. He feels his orgasm building in the base of his spine, tingling in his extremities, and then spiraling down to focus on the point where they connect, everything in his body going tight. River's back arches away from the wall as she gasps for breath, and he presses his finger hard to her clit on his next downstroke, bending his head to bit down hard on her shoulder to keep from crying out, and she shatters around him. He thrusts into her a few more times, feeling her muscles quiver around him, feeling her fingers spasming against his skin, hearing her desperate drags for air, and follows her over the edge.

"Fuck," he sighs, the moment he's able, and River laughs brightly. He presses a quick kiss to the fading red mark his bite left on her shoulder before pulling back, and carefully helping River right herself, and standing her own two feet. It takes all his self control not to comment on the slight shake in her legs before she drops the skirt of her dress. "So," he adds, stepping back and starting at the buttons on his shirt. "Final opinion on the new me?"

"Oh, my love," River says dismissively, rolling her eyes and reaching a hand up to fluff her hair. "It's all the same to me."

"Really?" he says, squinting at her. "You're not even going to compliment me a  _little_ bit?"

"Maybe later," she says, squatting to the ground to pat the area around her. It takes him a moment to realize she's trying to recover the pin she'd been using to pick the lock. "Right now I'm just trying to focus on the excellent sex as opposed to your evasive maneuvers."

He huffs, but he can't argue with that. He wishes he could tell her what he's been thinking this whole time. She finds the pin and sets to unlocking the door again, and he grabs his blazer off the floor, dusting it off a bit before shrugging it back on.

"It wasn't an evasive maneuver," he says.

"I was a soldier, you know, sort of," she says. "I know an evasive maneuver when I see one. Even if it was a  _very_ satisfying maneuver."

" _River_ ," he says, more firmly than even he was expecting. The lock gives a quiet click and she twists the knob and pushes it open, but turns to face him before stepping through, brow furrowed.

"What?"

"I don't want to..." he trails off, shrugging. "You matter too much for me to lie to you when I can avoid it. So I avoided it."

She eyes him thoughtfully for a long moment, and whatever she finds must satisfy her, because she doesn't look like she's going to slap him or run from him anymore. She nods decisively. "Fine."

"Fine?"

"Fine," she repeats, shrugging. "I hear you."

"Do you?" he asks, stepping toward her again. He shoves his hands in his pockets to keep himself from reaching for her, and just bends forward until he's face to face with her, close enough to kiss. "Because I'm never very clear about these things. I don't know how to be. But I want us to be fine. And clear."

Her face softens, and she leans forward just enough to press a glancing kiss to his lips. "Clear enough for now. Let's get the diamond and get out of here alive, and then we'll talk about the hundred or so more economical ways of saying I love you that most normal beings use, hm?"

Her words startle him, but he tries to hide it. Instead of reacting, he straightens, and holds his hand out to her.

He clears his throat. "Good," he says. "Alright."

She beams at him, his mad, wonderful wife, tangles her fingers with his, and off they run.


End file.
